Legionaries Of Christ Says It Accepts Pope's Decision To Reform Order

JIM MONE / AP

Jose Raul Gonzalez, right, pauses during a news conference with St. Paul, Minn., attorney Jeff Anderson in St. Paul, Minn., where a lawsuit was outlined on his behalf concerning the childhood abuse he alleges at the hands of his father, Rev. Marcial Maciel, who is shown at left in a photo with Pope John Paul II.

Jose Raul Gonzalez, right, pauses during a news conference with St. Paul, Minn., attorney Jeff Anderson in St. Paul, Minn., where a lawsuit was outlined on his behalf concerning the childhood abuse he alleges at the hands of his father, Rev. Marcial Maciel, who is shown at left in a photo with Pope John Paul II. (JIM MONE / AP)

Staff and Wire Reports

The Vatican's decision to assume leadership of the scandal-plagued Legionaries of Christ won acceptance Sunday from the order, but one of the men who has accused its founder of sexually abusing seminarians called for an independent inquiry into the broader church's actions in the case.

The reaction came a day after the Vatican issued an extraordinarily blunt statement about the Rev. Marcial Maciel Degollado and the religious order he founded in 1941 in Mexico. The order has a seminary in Cheshire.

Pope Benedict XVI appointed five Vatican investigators last year after the latest scandal involving Degollado: He had a child out of wedlock who was living in Spain, and higher-ups in the organization might have known about it. Degollado also has been accused of sexually abusing at least eight former Legionaries seminary students, aged 10 to 16, in the 1950s and 1960s, a story that was first reported by The Courant in 1998. Degollado died in 2008. He denied the sexual abuse charges.

The Vatican announced over the weekend that as a result of the investigation, the pope would name a papal delegate to govern the order and that a special commission would study its founding constitutions to reform it.

The Legionaries of Christ released a brief statement Sunday that it accepts the pope's decision.

"The Legionaries thank the Holy Father and embrace his provisions with faith and obedience," the statement said. "We are grateful for the prayers of so many people of good will who have supported us at this time."

Jim Fair, Chicago-based communications director for the Legion of Christ, said Sunday that the order had no details of the next steps in the reform process. "We're waiting just like everybody else," he said.

"The Holy Father said that he would announce the person that would be working with us," he added.

Officials at the seminary in Cheshire referred calls seeking comment to Fair.

In announcing the papal takeover, the Vatican excoriated Degollado for creating a "system of power" built on silence, deceit and obedience that enabled him to lead a double life "devoid of any scruples and authentic sense of religion" and allowed him to abuse young boys unchecked.

Jose Barba, one of the former seminarians who filed the canon law case against Degollado, expressed disappointment that there was no apparent attempt to investigate complicity in the church beyond Degollado and the Legionaries.

"Wasn't there silence from the Vatican? Weren't there coverups?" Barba said in calling for the creation of an independent commission for lay people to investigate the church's actions in the case of Degollaldo.

The Legionaries of Christ now has churches and schools throughout the world. It also has a wing of lay supporters known as the Regnum Christi, which has several facilities in Rhode Island. The Legionaries have a $650 million budget and more than 700 priests and 2,500 seminarians worldwide.